This copy is for your personal non-commercial use only. To order presentation-ready copies of Toronto Star content for distribution to colleagues, clients or customers, or inquire about permissions/licensing, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com

CoolSculpting promises to tackle the beer belly, painlessly

In the battle between six-pack abs and a six-pack of beer, CoolScupting says it's a non-invasive weight loss option.

By Robert Cribb

Fri., Dec. 4, 2015

Modern man is haunted by a stark choice: six-pack abs or six packs of beer.

Both entice with equal lure. But commitment to one cannot be simultaneous with commitment to the other. They are discreet and exclusionary desires.

Here’s the tension: the muscularly defined male midriff has emerged as an established cultural standard dominating the public consciousness. Every month, the covers of every men’s magazine display a rotating loop of identical male models posed beside identical headlines pitching the four, or six, or 22 steps to stomach definition.

By this measure, toned abs are the most crucial issue facing contemporary mankind. But it’s all a lie, of course. First, no matter how many crunches and push ups you do, you will almost certainly never look like that dude on the cover of the men’s magazines because they are airbrushed, anatomical freaks.

And how interesting could they really be hanging out with kettle bells for a living, devoting a disproportionate amount of brainpower to the art of posing and, most importantly, eschewing beer.

Article Continued Below

That lifestyle is a bridge too far to cross for the vast majority of us who wear a shirt to work and value the fraternity of after-work beer and cheese fries with the boys.

CoolSculpting, which one Toronto doctor says has a suprising number of male clients, is Harvard-developed, FDA-cleared, non-invasive fat freezing.

And so, we seek a middle ground for the mid-section, a balance between a life well lived and a belly well defined.

As with all contemporary problems, this one has spawned a technological solution: A fat-freezing procedure called CoolSculpting that sucks in your globulous spare tire like a Dyson vacuum and promises to kill the fat cells beneath with intense cold.

This isn’t the surgical liposuction that has remained largely the domain of women. This is Harvard-developed, FDA-cleared, non-invasive fat freezing that a surprising number of men seem to be open to exploring, says Dr. Frank Lista, who runs the Plastic Surgery Clinic in Toronto.

Half of his CoolSculpting clients are men seeking deflation of their love handles, pouches, back fat or man boobs. That’s a far larger percentage of men than any of the other cosmetic or surgical procedures, he says.

“Men are kind of chicken so they don’t like have to have surgery,” he says. “This is something you can do on your lunch break.”

As you sit reclined, your fat roll gets sucked into a large sucker thingy which “freezes” or crystallizes fat over the course of an hour. The cells die and begin shedding over the next three months, according to the company.

The not insignificant price of this technology depends on the individual. But generally speaking, treating two love handles or the stomach area rings in at between $1,500 and $2,500.

You’ve already figured out the male enticement here — a technologically induced method of having cake and eating it, too. It feels space aged. It’s how George Jetson would tone up.

Instead, Josh, a 32-year-old Torontonian, is doing it.

The Toronto businessman isn’t remotely overweight. He exercises regularly and generally eats well. He’s never had any cosmetic procedure before, not even a waxing.

But like many a Canadian lad, he does have a bit of Molson muscle encircling his core.

“As a typical Canadian guy, I like to drink beer,” he told me as he was being attached to the CoolSculpting machine. “I go running, but it’s tough to get rid of the last inch. And I work from home so I’m sitting behind a desk so I sometimes don’t get to be as active as I’d like to.”

You know what he’s talking about. However active you think you are, we’re all victims of the contemporary sedentary plague.

Among the first-world inconveniences of man chub is clothes shopping, says the 6’4”, 220 lbs. Josh, who asked that his last name not be published.

“I’m a tall guy and it can be hard enough to find clothes as it is. When you throw in a bit of a beer gut in there, it makes it tougher. It’s the sort of thing where I want to be able to put on a suit and not have it overhang.”

The overhang is a male ego killer.

So, does this method work? Three months after Josh’s procedure, the “after” photo does appear to show a trimmer silhouette than the pre-CoolSculpting version.

Online reviews for the procedure — like all online reviews — give a range of reactions but seem to be generally positive.

And you can’t argue with its futuristic appeal to men. It’s like video-game body-image management. The process is as powerful as the promise.

Toronto Star investigative reporter Robert Cribb’s video series Mankind explores relationships, career, fashion, style, health and fitness for men. He can be reached at rcribb@thestar.ca ; @cribbnote on Twitter or cribbnote on Instagram.

More from the Toronto Star & Partners

LOADING

Copyright owned or licensed by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or distribution of this content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Toronto Star Newspapers Limited and/or its licensors. To order copies of Toronto Star articles, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com